As the PGRNS is moving into its 6th year we would like to invite new members to join the committee. We have been overwhelmed by the fascinating work being done by postgraduates in gender across Scotland and we continue to facilitate a platform for gender researchers to connect and exchange ideas across disciplines and institutions.
Committee Member Responsibilities:
Running the email on a weekly rotation
Running the social media accounts (Twitter, Instagram and Facebook) on a weekly rotation by posting relevant news, funding and job opportunities, CfPs and events to our followers
Organising relevant blog posts on a monthly rotation. This can also mean delegating the blog post to a friend or fellow academic who is interested in writing about gender
Writing the newsletter and bulletin on a monthly rotation
Organising a workshop and/or a conference
Being a committee member will provide you with crucial experience for your academic CV:
Running a research network, organising a workshop and/or a conference, managing social media accounts and running a blog
And just as important; it gives you a unique opportunity to meet some extraordinary PGR students across Scotland to network and to form research collaborations and friendships.
If you are interested please apply by emailing us at pgrnscot@gmail.com by with:
Your Name
Institution
Discipline/Area of study
A few lines about why you would like to join the committee and what you would bring to the role.
Happy August campers! Now that summer is in full swing and most restrictions have been lifted, we hope you are caring for yourselves as much as you are caring about your research. This means taking advantage of the long sunny days, and spending time with those we care about. However, as the Olympics are underway and athletes from around the world show us their prowess, we are also witness to a great deal of discrimination against transgender athletes in particular. It is at times like these we remember why our research, outreach and activism matters the most. So keep reading to see what’s currently going on and what we have to look forward to in the new academic year!
Call for participants
Erin Rennie (PhD student at Glasgow Caledonian) is researching women and girl’s experiences of online harassment and abuse triggered by their involvement in social media activism that raises awareness of, and challenges violence against women and girls. Fill out the survey here: https://redcap.gcu.ac.uk/surveys/?s=FAMKD8E9L3
GENDER ONLINE
** Online Resources, Seminars, Materials and Events *
Literature Beyond Borders: Pakistani Women Writers
Read this excellent blog from Glasgow Women’s library, discussing their collaboration with their sister organisation, The Second Floor (T2F) at PeaceNiche, based in Karachi, Pakistan for excellent recommendations of Pakistani authors you can find and read at the GWL.
Looking for contributions on any topic for January-April 2021 from women/non-binary people currently doing or just finished a PhD in Scotland. For more information email phdwomenscot@gmail.com
Engender Blogs
En-Gender: Rolling CFP between 3,000-8,000 words on gender and religion, sex and sexuality, feminism and activism, motherhood and childcare. For more information email: engenderingthepast@gmail.com
JOBS AND PHD OPPORTUNITIES
Teaching Fellow in Social Policy (Inequalities and Health Policy)
Email us at PGRNScot@gmail.com to join the mailing list, tell us about an event or CFP, suggest a project, organise a virtual event etc.
Join our Facebook group: Post-graduate Gender Research Network of Scotland – it’s a semi-private group so you can find us but you can’t see what’s going on until you’re a member.
Happy July! We hope everyone is enjoying a restful start to the summer. You may notice that this month’s newsletter isn’t as packed as it usually is as the academic year has come to an end and there aren’t as many events on. We hope everyone is able to take time to unwind and enjoy the (hopefully hot) long summer days!
** Online Resources, Seminars, Materials and Events *
Gender Theory Syllabus
Prof. Alison Phipps (University of Sussex) has shared her 13 week MA Gender Studies course online, including reading lists, lesson plans and classroom principles. Read and download it here.
University of Glasgow Centre for Gender History: Living Gender History Podcast
Our friends at the CGH have released a podcast! The first episode is out and explores the history of domestic abuse and women’s refuges in Scotland. Listen to it on Apple podcasts or podbean.
GAPS Climate justice and conflict: Gender, peace and environmental rights
This 2-day online conference will explore the broad spectrum of materials which were used to shape and create the fashionable body – both male and female – in the early modern period, a time of great change with regards to the construction of clothing.
Call for participants for a study exploring queer teacher identity
The research will explore the experiences of LGBTQ+ early career teachers in relation to identity formation and navigation
If interested, email Charlotte Feather: bh20ff@student.sunderland.ac.uk
PhD Women Scotland
Looking for contributions on any topic for January-April 2021 from women/non-binary people currently doing or just finished a PhD in Scotland. For more information email phdwomenscot@gmail.com
Engender Blogs
En-Gender: Rolling CFP between 3,000-8,000 words on gender and religion, sex and sexuality, feminism and activism, motherhood and childcare. For more information email: engenderingthepast@gmail.com
JOBS AND PHD OPPORTUNITIES
Understanding the health and wellbeing of female police officers and staff
Funded (with stipend) PhD studentship at the University of Glasgow
Recruiting two LSE Fellows in Gender Studies who are able to contribute to MSc-level teaching in gender theory, and two of the following three areas: gender epistemologies and research methods, gender and human rights, and gender, culture and media.
Email us at PGRNScot@gmail.com to join the mailing list, tell us about an event or CFP, suggest a project, organise a virtual event etc.
Join our Facebook group: Post-graduate Gender Research Network of Scotland – it’s a semi-private group so you can find us but you can’t see what’s going on until you’re a member.
On May 31, 2021, the Chinese government announced the three-child policy, which will allow couples to have up to three children instead of the previous two-child limit. Such policy limits on the child-bearing number may seem a bit strange to people outside of China. However, to Chinese citizens, this is nothing new. The first birth control policy was introduced in 1979. Although there were multiple variations, the principal feature was the stringent limit of allowing only one child per couple. Before 2016 when the one-child policy was revised to a two-child policy, an overwhelming percentage of Chinese citizens were the only children within their families.
These birth-control policies were implemented essentially to adjust the population size, through which the country’s development could be optimized. At the same time, the policy had the unintended impact of changing the gender relations of society, in part through pushing couples to invest more in their female children. Traditionally in China, as in many other agrarian societies, sons carry on the family name and yield a better economic return and are therefore cultivated by the families. On the other hand, daughters are expected to marry into another family and thus not worthy of resources. However, as the one-child policy demanded that a couple could only have one child, a significant number of couples only had daughters as their heirs; daughters, therefore, have come to enjoy generous investments. At times, especially regarding educational investments, there appears to be a trend of ‘overcompensation’ for female children: to offer more educational resources for daughters to help them balance out the disadvantages they will face in the broader society. In a way, it can be said that the only-child policy inadvertently contributed to the empowerment of females born under the one-child context.
This is one reason why, when the one-child policy was switched to the two-child policy in 2016, the online space was filled with laments that the son preference will again rear its head. This is exhibited not so much through the discourse of ‘daughters will not be valued as much’ than the more emotion-ridden one of ‘those who have always want a son (but only have a daughter) are now backed up by the national policy to legitimize their (ugly) dreams’. Again without the original intention to touch on gender relations, the two-child policy has opened up a floodgate through which (mostly female) citizens channel their gender-related grievances, grievances that may have been rendered latent but not non-existent by the one-child situation. Just a few months before the three-child policy was announced, Chinese society was heavily engrossed in a movie featuring an elder sister imposed with the responsibility of taking care of her little brother after their son-loving parents passed away.
The current three-child policy, which was announced in relatively quick succession of the previous two-child limit, seems to have struck a rawer nerve amidst online space. There were so many angry comments that at one point, the government’s official Weibo account had to shut down the comment section. Slightly different from the reactions to the previous two-child switch, this time, the main gender-related focus lies predominantly within the welfare and life opportunities of women of potential child-bearing age. It was lamented that when companies assume women should give birth to three children rather than one, women will have a much harder time landing a proper career and will thus be reduced to child-bearing ‘machines’ at home, prohibited from public domains. If the response to the two-child policy revealed more about how women (daughters) resent being presumed unworthy, the current wave of grievances highlighted how women lamented not being able to fight this presumed unworthiness, i.e. create, accumulate and demonstrate their value to others through career achievements.
Overall, it is way too early to determine the actual impacts of the recent birth-control policies, either regarding the gender aspect or otherwise. Nevertheless, these policies reveal how a random policy has unintended yet considerable implications to the gender arena. By the time this blog was written, more than two weeks (which is exceptionally long by digital-age standards) have passed since the initial three-child announcement, and yet the online aftermath is still intense. All the emotional comments of how women’s lives may be ruined by this ‘non-compulsory yet highly indicative’ three-child allowance are harrowing, whilst simultaneously reminiscent of a kind of upbringing where young female children are cultivated to speak their minds and feel entitled to opinions, which hopefully does not dissolve with the recent more children per family situation.
References and extended reading
Fong, V. (2002). China’s one-child policy and the empowerment of urban daughters. American Anthropologist, 104(4), 1098–1109.
Liu, F. (2006). Boys as only children and girls as only children: Parental gendered expectations of the only-child in the nuclear Chinese family in present-day China. Gender and Education, 18(5), 491–505
Liu, Y. (2017). Women rising as half of the sky? An empirical study on women from the one-child generation and their higher education participation in contemporary China. Higher Education, 74(6), 963–978.
Tsui, M., & Rich, L. (2002). The only child and educational opportunity for girls in urban China. Gender & Society, 16(1), 74–92. Xu, Q., & Yeung, W. (2013). Hoping for a phoenix: Shanghai fathers and their daughters. Journal of Family Issues, 34(2), 182–207.
Yijie Wang is a PhD candidate at School of Education, University of Glasgow.
Join us for three separate sessions on how to write a Master’s dissertation that focuses on gender research. Hear tips and advice from the PGRNS committee who are currently completing their PhDs across different disciplines in Arts and Humanities and Social Sciences. You will also have the opportunity to ask any questions that you might have!
FINALLY we’re seeing some sunshine after what has been the coldest Scottish May in over 40 years. And with the Level 3 lockdown restrictions still in place in Glasgow, as well as the daily instances of human rights violations* and atrocities across the world becoming more and more horrific, it’s safe to say that the last few weeks have seemed pretty bleak. But certain to splash a bit of colour on June is Pride Month! We hope that this celebration reminds us all of the struggle for visibility, safety and freedom that the LGBTQIA+ community still faces, and encourages us to protect and advocate for all members of society, regardless of who they choose to be and love.
*Here at PGRN, we stand in solidarity with anyone living in danger of oppressive regimes, and we especially condemn the ethnic cleansing and colonial occupation of the people of Palestine, who are living in unimaginable conditions. For more news and resources on the Palestine struggle, as well as how we, in the UK, can help, see here.
On a lighter note, we’re excited to announce that we will be running several workshops on Mentoring Master’s Dissertations over the next few weeks! If you’re a current Masters student in Gender Studies/a related discipline and will be working on your dissertation over the summer, then we’d like to invite you along to our workshops where our committee members will be answering questions on anything from essay structure, to word count, to explaining what ‘methodology’ even means…basically the questions that you are too afraid to ask your professors! The committee members are currently working on their PhD’s, and so can offer lots of tips and advice on a Master’s dissertation. We are offering three online workshops, each an hour long and focusing on different elements of the dissertation, so feel free to pop along as and when you can:
Initial thoughts + literature reviews: Wednesday 9th June, 1pm
Data collection + analysis: Week beginning 21st June, exact date TBC
Please spread the word to your fellow students, and feel free to get in touch with us beforehand if there are any specific issues you would like us to discuss!
GENDER ONLINE
** Online Resources, Seminars, Materials and Events *
Gender Theory Syllabus
Prof. Alison Phipps (University of Sussex) has shared her 13 week MA Gender Studies course online, including reading lists, lesson plans and classroom principles. Read and download it here.
LSE Department of Gender Studies: Interdisciplinary workshops
The Epistemic Urgency of Conceptual Diversity – Reshaping Knowledge Production in the Social Sciences
June 1st and 2nd: 9:40-5:30pm BST
Registration is free and can be done in advance here.
RACE.ED panel event: ‘Racial Equity Work in the University and Beyond: The Race Equality Charter’
CLAW Napier research talks: “Just sex? The discursive construction of sexual violence in itnernet humour about #MeToo”, and “‘Tied up in knots’ – Ethical tensions in my research of linguistic violence on Twitter”
Looking for contributions on any topic for January-April 2021 from women/non-binary people currently doing or just finished a PhD in Scotland. For more information email phdwomenscot@gmail.com
Engender Blogs
En-Gender: Rolling CFP between 3,000-8,000 words on gender and religion, sex and sexuality, feminism and activism, motherhood and childcare. For more information email: engenderingthepast@gmail.com
FemQuant: feminist quantitative analyses of gendered inequalities
Looking for someone involved in community organising, passionate about intersectional feminism and want to get involved with one of Scotland’s fastest growing charities
Email us at PGRNScot@gmail.com to join the mailing list, tell us about an event or CFP, suggest a project, organise a virtual event etc.
Join our Facebook group: Post-graduate Gender Research Network of Scotland – it’s a semi-private group so you can find us but you can’t see what’s going on until you’re a member.
I am a 21-year-old, cisgender, heterosexual woman and was given a combined contraceptive pill when I was 14 years old; I am still on that pill today. Being on the pill for so long, I have a myriad of feelings towards this reproductive technology. I feel grateful I have control over my fertility and that I have few struggles obtaining the pill because prescriptions are free in Scotland. However, I suffer tremendously from anxiety induced from the hormones pumped into my body from the pill. For a few days a month I cannot cope with everyday activities because I become too overwhelmed with the world around me. Others suffer from depression, PMS (pre-menstrual syndrome), severe cramping, excessive bleeding on their periods, the list goes on.
Moreover, being on the pill has made me all too aware of problems women face in medicine every day. Our concerns are blind-sided: we are assumed to be overreacting; we can handle pain; that the side-effects of the pill “aren’t that bad” (a direct quote from my GP when I expressed concern over the levels of anxiety I was facing around my period). It seemed unfair, but I did not question these social arrangements; if I did not want to fall pregnant, I had to take these pills.
When I saw the documentary series, ‘Sex Explained’ on Netflix (2020), the episode on birth control, I realised how indoctrinated I was to this system where I, and others with female reproductive systems, often believe we must hold primary control over fertility, despite two parties being required to reproduce. It was here that I began my research, interest, and personal investment into the creation of a male pill.
I read ‘The Male Pill: A Biography of a Technology in the Making’ by Nelly Oudshoorn (2003) and learned about the history of the male pill and why a male pill had yet to be created: worries over masculinity, questions of whether women would ever trust men, and others. Despite these barriers, people have begged for a male pill, saying current contraceptives arrangements are problematic, “[sending] the message that women should be content and grateful for the current situation… as a matter of social justice, we should move toward shared contraception responsibility.” (Campo-Engelstein, 2012). I too agree that having a male pill could ease burden of responsibility, encouraging men to take accountability over their status as reproductive beings, and allow women to not suffer side-effects, and discriminatory healthcare, alone.
And yet, what really caught my attention was the question raised by some feminist authors and academics; would a male contraceptive really be better for women? An article written by Angela Phillips (2006) summaries the main worry some have of the male pill, “we are in danger of losing track of the bigger issue: control of conception. The pill gives women control of the fertility tap. She decides when to turn it off but just as important she decides (after discussion we hope) when to turn it back on.” Women have fought, and continue to fight, for control over their bodies, especially regarding reproduction, with the pill often cited as a champion for this autonomy.
One only needs to turn to abortion for proof, a right women across the world struggle to gain and hold onto, often facing off against men trying to regulate their role as reproductive beings. Would giving men an ‘in’ into reproductive control, a domain some men arguably attempt to force themselves into already, really be beneficial? Sure, it would be nice to not have the sole burden of unsavoury side-effects, but I can trust the partner I am with to have discussions with me and not abuse its power should a male pill ever exist. Unfortunately, some women do not have this luxury, and may be in abusive or unhealthy relationships where men can exert even greater hold over them and their bodies with a male pill. Therefore, before we rejoice at the next article that claims the male pill is 5 years away from development, we need to consider whether this technology really would be for the betterment of women, or would it cause more problems than it claims will be solved.
Catriona Reid is a Masters student at the University of Strathclyde studying Applied Gender Studies (Research Methods). She has a BSc (Hons) in Psychology. Her current research is examining British newspapers to understand whether a male contraceptive pill could be considered and understood as a feminist technology. She currently volunteers at the Rape Crisis Scotland helpline.
Campo-Engelstein, L., 2012. Contraceptive justice: why we need a male pill. AMA Journal of Ethics, 14(2), pp.146-151.
Oudshoorn, N., 2003. The male pill: A biography of a technology in the making. Duke University Press.
Image: ‘Fight with & for all of us’ – People raising their fists holding up a sign that says “We believe struggling against war & militarism means fighting for the liberation of womxn & black, brown, queer, trans, disabled & stateless people around the world.” By Grae Rosa Source: JustSeeds
We have made it almost halfway through 2021 and Scotland is slowly emerging out of lockdown. The past month has seen nationwide protests of the planned new police bill in the U.K. which curtails the right to protest, culturally attacks gypsy, roma and traveller communities and endorses deeply corrupt and racially biased policing methods. We stand in solidarity with those protesting ✊
Since the pandemic started, there has been a rise of hate crimes and violence against people with Asian backgrounds across the globe. We cannot stand for this. Call out injustice when you encounter it, step in, actively challenge anti-Asian biases whenever and wherever you see it and listen to their experiences! As a network we would like to tell all our Asian siblings that we are here for you and join you in fighting back ✊
May 6th also marks an important date in Scotland’s political life as the country takes to the ballot box and elects a new parliament. For those of you who are eligible to vote in this upcoming election, let’s make our vote count for women, for our trans-siblings, for queer people, for BIPOC, for migrants, for disabled folks and all those who are vulnerable and marginalised!
Remember to rest and take care of yourselves ✨
GENDER ONLINE
** Online Resources, Seminars, Materials and Events *
Gender Theory Syllabus
Prof. Alison Phipps (University of Sussex) has shared her 13 week MA Gender Studies course online, including reading lists, lesson plans and classroom principles. Read and download it here.
A new cultural reckoning? Gendered violence and misogyny in Australia and the UK
What’s the true extent of gendered violence in Australia and the UK today? And are our policies and laws doing enough to keep women safe? Join our panel, chaired by former Australian Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, to discuss.
Living Gender in Diverse Times: Young People’s Understandings and Practices of Gender in the Contemporary UK Online conference Date: 21st May 2021 More information
WCCJJ are working with Bristol University Press to develop a book proposal. The editors warmly welcome submissions from academics and researchers on the topic of gender and green criminology. Please submit a 200-word abstract of your proposed chapter to tanya.wyatt@northumbria.ac.uk on or before May 31st 2021. Accepted chapters must not be previously published. All manuscripts will be subject to a peer-review process before they are finally accepted for publication. Launch of the book is planned for March 2023.
Early Modern Men: Patriarchs, Patriots and Pricks in Europe, 1500-1800. An Interdisciplinary History Conference
Looking for contributions on any topic for January-April 2021 from women/non-binary people currently doing or just finished a PhD in Scotland. For more information email phdwomenscot@gmail.com
Engender Blogs
En-Gender: Rolling CFP between 3,000-8,000 words on gender and religion, sex and sexuality, feminism and activism, motherhood and childcare. For more information email: engenderingthepast@gmail.com
Email us at PGRNScot@gmail.com to join the mailing list, tell us about an event or CFP, suggest a project, organise a virtual event etc.
Join our Facebook group: Post-graduate Gender Research Network of Scotland – it’s a semi-private group so you can find us but you can’t see what’s going on until you’re a member.
Scrolling through Instagram this week, I was pleased to see a friend had shared a meme from an account named @savedbythebellhooks, which read: ‘Whether we’re talking about race or gender or class, popular culture is where the pedagogy is, it’s where the learning is.’ Writing about images of sexual violence in literature and film can often draw up confusing feelings – I recognise the urgency of research in this area, but find myself worrying that my particular focus on textual representations is a less pressing, or more flippant matter. I’m sometimes left wondering whether I should have chosen to work in the realm of the ‘real world’, producing research with real life effects like that of my colleagues in the discipline.
The hooks quote, in all its meme silliness, brought me the comfort and validation that I so often look for as a first-year PhD (and perhaps it’s undignified to admit that I search for this at all, but I do!) Consuming culture is a pedagogical practice – the acts of reading and watching encourage us to become involved in making moral judgements, understanding complex characters and their motivations, as well as mediating with identities that differ from our own. At the risk of sounding trite, books and films (and, of course, TV – but this is beyond the scope of my research) teach us about lives and experiences that are not our own. This opens us up to empathetic potentials and, I think critically, the ‘apprehension’ of other lives that Judith Butler sees as so key in our recognition of others’ humanity.
Without delving into the messiness of defining ‘popular culture’, I’m appropriating it here to describe some of the examples of literature and film I look at in my thesis. All of the texts I focus on deal with sexual violence in some way, whether this is a key feature of the narrative events or a smaller plot point; considering works in English and French means that I’m frequently met with a variety of linguistic, as well as cultural, differences in the representations of all aspects of sexual violence – victimhood, perpetuation, survival. I proceed with caution when asserting that fiction is anything other than an exercise in storytelling, but fundamentally believe that the little truths within have plenty to say about our real lives and experiences. In considering representations of sexual violence specifically, I agree with Tanya Horeck that ‘[s]tories of rape are essential to the way in which the body politic is imagined, serving as a site for cultural conflict and the embodiment of public concerns’ (2004, p. vii).
All of the texts in my thesis have been released in the period from 2014 to the present; a period in which we’ve seen seismic shifts in public conversations about abuse, sexual violence and accountability. What, then, do my texts have to say about this? Do we see, for example, echoes of what has frequently been viewed as a schism between French and Anglo-American notions of consent and seduction? Are there implicit or explicit reflections on #MeToo (and adjacent digital movements like #BalanceTonPorc in France)? Novels like This Is Pleasure by Mary Gaitskill or films such as Promising Young Woman seem to obviously deal with the concerns of our current discursive moment – how is punishment doled out or evaded for perpetuators of abuse, what is to be said about male complicity? – while rape-revenges like Coralie Fargeat’s Revenge or Édouard Louis’ autofictional History of Violence mediate with notions of race, class and believability quite differently.
My research examines representations, but it is impossible to separate these representational features from the sociocultural realities that imbue them with meaning. I want to know how concepts like Sharon Marcus’s rape script come across in surreal novellas like Peach by Emma Glass, or how Judith Butler’s ideas on grievability and precarious lives apply to our victim-avengers in rape-revenge movies. Importantly, as when considering all instances of speaking out about sexual violence, we must consider whose stories are told and prioritised, and whose are hidden? Reading and thinking about this stuff can be, objectively, grim but I think it’s ultimately valuable work. I’ll continue, hopefully with the support of Instagram meme accounts, to take (popular) culture seriously, to take it as a lens through which we might begin to make sense of not only sexual violence but of class, gender and race in today’s world, and encourage you to join me!
I use apprehension here in the sense that it is defined by Butler in Frames of War. Apprehension ‘can imply marking, registering, acknowledging without full cognition. (…) What we are able to apprehend is surely facilitated by norms of recognition, but it would be a mistake to say that we are utterly limited by existing norms of recognition when we apprehend a life’ (p.64)
In referencing MeToo, I am here referring primarily to the hashtag movement with the acknowledgment that this stemmed from Tarana Burke’s ongoing work and activism.
Works Cited
Butler, J. (2009: 2016) Frames of War: When Is Life Grievable? New York: Verso.
Butler, J. (2004: 2020) Precarious Life: The Powers of Mourning and Violence. New York: Verso.
Horeck, T. (2004) PUBLIC RAPE: Representing violation in fiction and film. New York: Routledge. Marcus, S. (1992) ‘Fighting bodies, fighting words: a theory and politics of rape prevention’’. In: Butler, J. (ed.) Feminists Theorize the Political. London and New York: Routledge, pp. 385-403.
Emma Flynn is a PhD researcher in Gender Studies at the University of Strathclyde. She has an MLitt in Comparative Literature. Her current research focuses on representations of sexual violence in contemporary English and French literature and film. She runs a feminist/gender theory reading group called FEARY with Glasgow Zine Library.
Image: Kelvingrove Park, Glasgow, 15th March 2021. @pgrnscot
** CW: Violence against women.
March was tough. Despite celebrating International Women’s Day on the 8th, the month was filled with heartbreaking headlines of violence against women. The murder of Sarah Everard has ignited widespread discussions of the prevalence of violence against women as it was reported that 97% of women have been sexually harassed. This news came in the same week where the bodies of Bennylyn Burke and her daughter were found in Dundee. It is a problem of patriarchy and intersectional issue that disproportionately affects women of colour, trans and non-binary people and disabled women who often do not receive the same level of media attention. In the US, in an act of racism, misogyny and White supremacy, a man murdered eight people, six of whom were Asian women (Daoyou Feng, Hyun Jung Grant, Xiaojie Tan,Yong Ae Yue, Suncha Kim, Sonn Chung Park and Delaina Ashley Yaun, Paul Michels). We all deserve better.
With the success of our Gendering 2020+1 Conference back in February, we are keen to organise more events to connect as a network. So, this month we are hosting TWO virtual events! The first is our PGRNS Writing Retreat on Wednesday 7th April, followed by our PGRNS Coffee Morning on Wednesday 21st April. Both sessions will be relaxed and informal, giving you a space to meet other postgraduate gender researchers. The writing retreat will be a structured writing session with breaks throughout the day to have a chat with one another, and the coffee morning will allow time for even more of a chat! Everyone is welcome.
GENDER ONLINE
** Online Resources, Seminars, Materials and Events *
Gender Theory Syllabus
Prof. Alison Phipps (University of Sussex) has shared her 13 week MA Gender Studies course online, including reading lists, lesson plans and classroom principles.
A reading list collated by Policy Press and Bristol University Press in response to the tragic death of Sarah Everard, and the subsequent heavy handed policing of the solidarity vigil in London.
CinemaAttic have produced a selection of ten international short films seeking to expose patterns of masculinity that must be left behind, as well as alternative views on how men are dealing with manhood today. In particular, these films look at the tension between the individual experience of masculinity and group (or gang) masculinity, where anger, dominance and violence are often the only emotions reinforced. Stories take place in Bradford, Edinburgh, Galicia, Catalonia, Philippines, Chile, Argentina or El Salvador.
Gender, Subjectivity and ‘Everyday Health’ in the Post-1945 World Seminar Series (University of Essex)
Love, Guilt and Anxiety: Parent-Child Relationships in Post-War Britain
Date: 12th April 2021: 1-2pm. Find out more and book tickets here.
Youth, Sexual Knowledge and Sexual Pleasure in the 1980s
Date: 26th April 2021: 6-7pm. Find out more and book tickets here.
FemQuant: ‘How many children do you have?’ On the outside looking in.
Dr Laura Brown (UCL) reflects on the challenges of researching breastfeeding as a not-yet-mother. Whilst feminism respects women’s autonomy and empowers women’s variety of life “choices”, our positionality within our research projects can challenge our own identities. Qualitative research encourages reflexivity, and we don’t always do this so well as quantitative researchers. Reflecting back on her PhD research, Laura offers critical reflections on why, who and how she studied for her project on environmental links with breastfeeding.
Beauty, Ugliness, and Ideas of Racial Difference: black women in 19th century
Dr Rochelle Rowe will explore the ways in which black women have been used as subjects of beauty, ugliness, and markers of difference – scientific, ethnographic and artistic – in the pursuit of knowledge. It will follow the lives of two women, Sara Baartman, whose treatment as the human exhibition ‘The Hottentot Venus’ is by now infamous, and Fanny Eaton, the little-known Jamaican-born woman who worked as an artist’s model in Victorian London.
In Conversation with Dame Professor Marina Warner: ‘Inventory of A Life Mislaid’
Join Toppings & Company Booksellers’ online event with Dame Professor Marina Warner, the President of the Royal Society of Literature. She will be in conversation with Professor Susan Sellers of the University of St Andrews’ School of English, to celebrate the publication of Inventory of a Life Mislaid.
CAPPE (Centre for Applied Philosophy, Politics and Ethics) 16th Annual Interdisciplinary Conference, University of Brighton, UK.
‘The Politics of Reproduction’ – papers are welcomed including but not limited to topics such as; reproductive technologies, caring labour, social reproduction theory, the political economy of care, reproduction/care and neoliberalism, reproduction and the far right.
WCCJJ are working with Bristol University Press to develop a book proposal. The editors warmly welcome submissions from academics and researchers on the topic of gender and green criminology. Please submit a 200-word abstract of your proposed chapter to tanya.wyatt@northumbria.ac.uk on or before May 31st 2021. Accepted chapters must not be previously published. All manuscripts will be subject to a peer-review process before they are finally accepted for publication. Launch of the book is planned for March 2023.
Early Modern Men: Patriarchs, Patriots and Pricks in Europe, 1500-1800. An Interdisciplinary History Conference
Looking for contributions on any topic for January-April 2021 from women/non-binary persons currently doing or just finished a PhD in Scotland. For more information email phdwomenscot@gmail.com
Engender Blogs
En-Gender: Rolling CFP between 3,000-8,000 words on gender and religion, sex and sexuality, feminism and activism, motherhood and childcare. For more information email: engenderingthepast@gmail.com
JOBS AND PHD OPPORTUNITIES
Asa Briggs PhD Studentship in History (Open University)
The Open University is offering the inaugural Asa Briggs Studentship in History to support Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) postgraduate research degree students with a specific interest in British history from 1750.
PhD Studentship: Creating spaces for children who are victims and witnesses of violence to be heard and supported: Exploration of the multi-dimensional use of space in Scotland’s first Barnahus (Child’s House)
In collaboration with SGSSS and the University of Edinburgh.
Email us at PGRNScot@gmail.com to join the mailing list, tell us about an event or CFP, suggest a project, organise a virtual event etc.
Join our Facebook group: Post-graduate Gender Research Network of Scotland – it’s a semi-private group so you can find us but you can’t see what’s going on until you’re a member.
The Postgraduate Gender Research Network of Scotland 